About 45 tax and fee increases take effect in Indiana July 1, the start of the new fiscal year.

Most of the tax and fee hikes the legislature passed this year are pretty routine, says John Ketzenberger, president of the Indiana Fiscal Policy Institute. The exceptions are tied to road funding – chiefly, a 10 cent-per-gallon gas tax hike.

“Gosh,” says Ketzenberger, “It’d been almost 20 years since we raised the fuel taxes, so it is unusual, and we talked about it for a couple of years before we did it.”

U.S. Senate Republicans released their version of a bill to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act Thursday and there was reaction from both sides of the aisle in Indiana.

The Senate’s health care bill is similar to the House version in that it would get rid of the ACA individual mandate to receive health care coverage, cut back on Medicaid spending, allow states to waive services, and defund Planned Parenthood.

Eric Holcomb leaves Monday for his first international economic development trip as governor. He’ll spend 10 days in Hungary and France, hoping to shore up global ties for Indiana’s top-earning manufacturing and automotive industries.

Indiana is already a center of investment for countries that include Japan and Germany. But the Indiana Economic Development Corporation says the Hoosier State will be the first to create what it calls a “formal framework with Hungary” to promote business and trade development.

A couple of towns and a city in West Central Indiana are among a majority of Indiana municipalities focusing the most recent round of Community Development Block Grant funding on water system improvements.

The Town of Oxford, in Benton County, is focusing its funding on a stormwater program to prevent flooding in residential areas.

The state granted $500,000 each to Oxford and the Cass County town of Royal Center, as well as $550,000 to Attica.